Coronavirus Crisis: Main Thread

[dada]

Lockdown the internet.

[Belligerent Savant]

^^^^^^

If only that could be mandated. So much fear and propaganda would end the moment the internet is shut down. Add cable TV to the edict; within days the madness we've endured since early 2o2o would end, and mental/physical health would improve dramatically.

Hell, keep it shut down for an entire year and we may absolve ourselves of historical lunacy as well. Humans would surely get along better without such white noise. They'd rediscover their natural environs and fellow neighbors -- without screens as barriers.

[Belligerent Savant]

.

Back on topic.

Calling out the excessive draconian measures currently forced upon us by govts should not be a political wedge topic. It speaks to the conditioning methods in play here in the U.S. that anyone has to explicitly state, preemptively, that being against excessive mandates does not equate to support for Trump.

Lunacy, once again.

More info on earlier reporting on the Danish study -- and ask yourself: if indeed it's true this finding isn't being reported more widely -- why? Why would it be suppressed?



https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-6817

Also: can anyone provide a rational explanation for a forced 10pm curfew?

At what point will the majority awaken from their zombie-like slumber? It may be too late by then.

Truly a disappointment, the extent fear has taken hold, overriding reason and agency.

This 'tweet' here may be silly, but the insipid curfew restriction deserves no better:

[conniption]

Lockdown the internet.

NooooOOOoo...!!!



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjmVn9TD6HQ

[conniption]

Now about those protests all over Europe that we never hear about... unless of course, you google them with all the proper key words... we don't really need to hear or read about them because... COVID, COVID, COVID!!! How many cases today? Oodles and oodles, evidently. Our news has become infected with a pandemic of fear, dread, gloom and doom 24/7. And it's got to be real because...because... Science. What do those case numbers mean to me? Nothing really. I mean, how many people did they test? How many people did they test on the day the number was low? How many might have had false positives, that is to say, how accurate are the tests? How many of those testing positive had symptoms? How many people in the spikes of cases actually succumb to the disease? Do I believe much of anything they tell me? No.

One more point I'd like to make. There is another school of thought on maintaining our health and well-being that has little to do with the practice of medicine as we know it. As crazy as it sounds, I personally cannot bring myself to trust a medical system whose prime motivation is money when they obviously make more money if people are sick and stay that way. Then their only hurdle is cornering the market and getting rid of the competition.

Now one of my earliest mentors from 40 years ago, who was opposed to the flu vaccine, explained it this way... He would say, They can't even cure the common cold and the reason why is because a cold is an action of the body to rid itself of toxins and other waste matter which has accumulated to the point where it requires the discharge of mucus to eliminate it. He blamed the seasonal cold on the fact that people often tanned in the summer, which closes the pores of the skin thus blocking the 2 to 3 pounds of waste per day that would have exited the skin. He went on to say, if you suppress or block the actions of a cold it will come back as a flu and if you continue to suppress the actions of the flu you end up with worse symptoms... maybe pneumonia.

Anyway, even though I'm not the best health food zealot on the block, I do understand what it means to be fit. And when it comes to schools of thought... the hell with science if they're telling me to close my non-essential store, wear a mask, distance myself from everyone and everything I love, and inject more toxins into the bloodstream. Sounds like quite an imposition to me.


~~~

off-guardian

Anti-Lockdown Protests All Across Europe
Increasingly draconian lockdown measures, economic destitution, and sweeping police powers are evaporating public trust and eroding public patience.

Nov 19, 2020
Comments

As the alleged “second wave” of the Coronavirus “pandemic” is reported to be sweeping across Europe in recent weeks, many governments have enthusiastically embraced their totalitarian side and granted themselves sweeping new “emergency powers” alongside new lockdown measures.

The public has been markedly less co-operative this time around. Rebelling against the seemingly arbitrary limitations which are not supported by either science or common sense. Protests have taken place all across the continent.

Germany

Thousands of people gathered in Berlin over the last few days, protesting the Merkel government passing a new lockdown law. Police turned water cannons on the crowds, and nearly 200 people were arrested.

According to reliable sources, elements of Antifa rushed to the scene of the Anti-New Normal Totalitarianism protest in Berlin today, hoping to hold the "Corona Deniers" down, so that the cops could hose them real good, but they were just a little too late. pic.twitter.com/RdQ67qYjnN

— Consent Factory (@consent_factory) November 18, 2020

The mainstream reported “hundreds” of protesters, but as pictures plainly show it was more like tens of thousands:

“Thanks for the picture Majd Abboud, not hundreds, not thousand, but ten’s of thousands protested in Berlin today and it’s only the beginning of something big…” Sonja Van Ende#Covid_19 pic.twitter.com/hLxNaTEqYv

— vanessa beeley (@VanessaBeeley) November 19, 2020

Berlin, Berlin, das wird Folgen haben… pic.twitter.com/SbDca1k5FA

— Bajazz3.0 (@BatschkappMZ) November 18, 2020

Spain

After the Prime Minister of Spain Pedro Sanchez declared a sixth-month state of emergency in late October, there were days of protests across the country.

Barcelona, already a hot-bed of anti-government feeling due to the brutal repression of the Catalan Independence referendum, saw violent confrontations between riot police and protestors



France

Emmanuel Macron’s brand new “comprehensive security law”, known by protesters as the “gag law”, would further militarise French police whilst making it a crime to capture or distribute the image of police officer. It has met fervent resistance in the shape of angry marches through cities across the country.

Protesters across France took to the streets after a law called the Global Security Bill was passed, which outlawed taking photos of police that could be used to expose an officer’s identity.https://t.co/KQjtfWpXhU#StopLoiSecuriteGlobale #StopTheGlobalSecurity pic.twitter.com/WYpy0BCbLU

— Protests.media (@ProtestsMedia) November 19, 2020

Macron’s government has a history of attacking civil liberties, and in response to his “reforms” the country has seen large-scale protests by the Gilets Jaunes for over a year.

Italy

The anti-lockdown protests in Italy reached a fever pitch in late October, and were probably the most extensive on the continent. Marches occurred in dozens of cities across the country, including Rome, Naples, Genoa and Bologna.

BOLOGNA, ITALY: The conscience of a country’s population standing against their politicians speaks through this woman who says her life has been destroyed by lockdowns & has nothing to eat or to feed her 3 year old child:pic.twitter.com/84MEBgglkV

— Robin Monotti Graziadei (@robinmonotti) October 29, 2020

The mainstream media went out fo their way to undercut and smear the protests. CNN and Reuters reported only “hundreds” of protesters. Does this photo have “hundreds” of people in it?



Politico went so far as to actually blame the protests on the Mafia.

Slovakia

Bratislava was home to a huge march of protesters on November 17th, marking the national holiday known as Fight for Freedom Day. These marches were illegal under the Slovakian emergency law, notionally designed to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

BRATISLAVA, SLOVAKIA: Anti-Covid restrictions & anti-government protests despite a ban on public gatherings, on the anniversary of the Velvet Revolution of 1989 & the student demonstration against Nazi occupation of 1939: https://t.co/UzfBlhDoKcpic.twitter.com/oWqhlSTfex

— Robin Monotti Graziadei (@robinmonotti) November 18, 2020

DENMARK

The Danish parliament was subject to 9 days of protests right outside its doors, in opposition to the proposed “vaccination law”, which would allow the police to “physically coerce vaccination through detainment”.

DENMARK: 9 days of protests over a new law that “would be able to define groups of people who must be vaccinated. People who refuse the above can be coerced through physical detainment, with police allowed to assist.”pic.twitter.com/LN0SBVKUE8

— Robin Monotti Graziadei (@robinmonotti) November 14, 2020

After nine days of protests, it was reported on social media that the Danish gov’t had dropped the law. However, I could find no official confirmation of that, or reports in the media.

DENMARK: GOOD NEWS! After 9 days of banging pots & pans outside parliament the epidemic law is SCRAPPED. PROTESTING WORKS: DO IT!#WeWillNotComply pic.twitter.com/iFuszio05P

— Robin Monotti Graziadei (@robinmonotti) November 15, 2020

In fact, the media have barely covered the proposed law, and literally not mentioned the protests in Copenhagen at all. A search for “Covid protests Denmark” on google, turns up almost no results relating to that topic.

The reason to cover the Danish protest less than the others is that they apparently worked. and the last thing the establishment wants people to see is that civil disobedience can change anything.

*

It’s good to see the general public’s fraying sense of patience with a Covid narrative that has never made any sense, and a “pandemic response” which is likely to do far more damage than it ever could prevent.

Though civil unrest is undeniably a good and powerful thing, this is also a time to be wary. If the establishment feel they are losing control of the situation or the narrative, they are likely to double down or try something desperate.
If you’re aware of other countries experiencing civil unrest due to “anti-covid” measures, please let us know and we will add them to the list.
https://off-guardian.org/2020/11/19/ant ... ss-europe/

[dada]

"Politico went so far as to actually blame the protests on the Mafia."

How silly to even suggest.

[stickdog99]

https://www.medtechdive.com/news/hhs-pi ... es/589384/

HHS piloting Cue's NBA-tested rapid COVID-19 diagnostic in 5 states

The Department of Health and Human Services disclosed Thursday it's launched a pilot program to surveil coronavirus spread in nursing homes and similar facilities using rapid molecular test kits from Cue Health. Specifically, the tests will be used for "quick confirmatory testing of positives and suspicious negatives in high-concern populations and congregate care settings," Cue outlined.

Unlike lab-based molecular tests, which can take two to three days for turnaround, Cue's rapid molecular point-of-care test generates results in about 20 minutes. News of an initial rollout to five states follows a $481 million contract from HHS and the Department of Defense in mid-October to increase U.S. production to 100,000 test kits per day come March 2021. Cue received an emergency use authorization for its test in June.

...

HHS' Cue effort is less expansive than the Abbott initiative. Abbott reported its product has shown sensitivity of 97.1% and 98.5%. By contrast, Cue claims its product delivers sensitivity of 98.7% and specificity of 96.7%.

*****

OK, so let's break this down a bit. The US federal government paid almost $500 million to roll out a rapid antigen test whose own manufacturer claims has 3.3% false positive rate!

This means that more than 3.3% of the those tested must actually have COVID-19 for the true positives this test uncovers to outnumber this tests' false positives. And as the actual rate rate of infection declines, false positives start to overwhelm true positives.

If 1 in 50 of the tested population actually has COVID-19, then this test gives 10 false positives for every 6 true positives. This means that there is only a 37.5% chance that a subject who tests positive actually has COVID-19, and this inflates the measured positivity rate of the tested population from 2% to 5.3% (a 166% increase).

If 1 in 100 of the tested population actually has COVID-19, then this test gives 10 false positives for every 3 true positives. This means that there is only a 23.1% chance that a subject who tests positive actually has COVID-19, and this inflates the measured positivity rate of the tested population from 1% to 4.3% (a 333% increase).

If 1 in 300 of the tested population actually has COVID-19, then this test gives 10 false positives for every 1 true positive. This means that there is only a 11.1% chance that a subject who tests positive actually has COVID-19, and this inflates the measured positivity rate of the tested population from 0.3% to 3.7% (a 1100% increase).

Furthermore, as the actual positivity rate declines from 2% to 0.33% (a 83% decline) the positivity rate measured by this shitty antigen test that our government has already sunk half a billion into declines from 5.3% to just 3.7% (just a 30% decline).

[stickdog99]

Again, I would love for someone to try to convince me that the US federal government in not trying to kill off nursing home patients by quarantining patients who get false positives with actually sick and contagious patients on the basis of the large number of false positives that the only tests they are willing to fund deliver.

https://www.desertsun.com/story/news/he ... 334480002/

Leaders in multiple states, including Nevada, Vermont and Illinois, have moved to ban antigen tests in nursing homes or limit their use.

"I thought the hard part was getting the testing to the different facilities," said David Grabowski, a health care policy professor at Harvard Medical School. Instead, he said, "The major barriers to the use of rapid testing seem to be a lack of guidance on when and how to use the tests, coupled with concerns about their accuracy."

Dr. Michael Wasserman, immediate past president of the California Association of Long Term Care Medicine, said the national effort has been chaotic and inadequate.

The federal government "just hands stuff off to nursing homes and then says, 'Hey, it's yours; go use it,'" he said. "And then when things fall apart, 'We're not to blame.'"

Nursing homes that don't trust the rapid tests are having to shoulder the higher cost of lab tests. It costs Stuart Almer, president and CEO of Gurwin Jewish Nursing & Rehabilitation Center on New York's Long Island, $125,000 a week to conduct lab tests on up to 1,500 residents and staff members.

"We embrace the testing," Almer said. "But how are we supposed to continue operating and paying for this?"

Goodwin House in Virginia, which includes skilled nursing and assisted living facilities, had performed more than 9,500 tests for COVID-19 as of late October, said Joshua Bagley, an administrator. Only 100 of them were antigen tests. "The majority of our focus is still toward the PCR testing," Bagley said.

The concerns of state health officials were perhaps most evident in Nevada, where in early October the state banned antigen testing in nursing homes. HHS said the order was illegal, and it was revoked within days.

"There is no such thing as a perfect test," Adm. Brett Giroir, a senior HHS official who leads the Trump administration's COVID-19 testing efforts, said on a call with reporters Nov. 9. For example, Giroir said, a risk of PCR tests is that they could provide a positive diagnosis when a person is no longer "actually infectious."

Although there have been widespread accuracy concerns over antigen tests, certain tests the administration is distributing nationwide have comparable accuracy to lab-based tests, he said.

Other state responses have not been as aggressive as Nevada's but nonetheless demonstrated unease over how best to use the devices, if at all.

Vermont recommends the use of antigen tests after a known COVID-19 exposure but says they should not be used to diagnose asymptomatic people.

Ohio was initially reluctant to deploy them after Republican Gov. Mike DeWine's false positive result from an antigen device, although the tests have since been adopted, said Peter Van Runkle, executive director of the Ohio Health Care Association, which represents some skilled nursing facilities in the state.

Some nursing homes say relying on antigen tests has made a monumental difference. In Hutchinson, Kansas, Wesley Towers Retirement Community has used both types of tests, but it was Abbott's BinaxNOW antigen test that detected its first two asymptomatic people with COVID-19, said Gretchen Sapp, Wesley Towers' vice president of health services.

[stickdog99]

From 10/28, around the time the supposed spike in COVID-19 began:

The Trump administration has heralded these rapid tests as a crucial tool in allowing states to reopen. But Vermont's guidelines strongly encourage the use of gold-standard PCR laboratory tests for the detection of the novel coronavirus — particularly in eldercare facilities. Antigen tests, the state says, should generally be used only on symptomatic people due to accuracy concerns.

Twenty-nine of Vermont's 35 nursing homes reported that they had received the antigen test machines. Fourteen of those homes have performed at least one test, and some have performed hundreds, according to data submitted on October 11 to the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which regulates nursing homes.

,,,

Since then, Reichert said, the Broad Institute has promised quicker results. The state uses the private Massachusetts lab to handle routine testing for Vermont's nursing homes, and officials said the contract requires a 24-hour turnaround time for results once samples reach the lab. But Reichert said she's started using the antigen tests for additional screening of staff, as well as to test other workers who need to enter the home.

To test symptomatic residents, Reichert said, she uses the PCR tests instead.

The U.S. Food & Drug Administration gave emergency authorization for the first COVID-19 antigen test in May. Since then, it's authorized five other antigen tests. These tests have been vetted for their ability to detect the virus in patients experiencing symptoms within the first few days after onset.

But questions remain about their accuracy, particularly when given to asymptomatic people and in areas with low prevalence of the virus. The first test to win emergency approval from the FDA, made by San Diego-based Quidel, was at the center of a July incident in which 64 people tested positive at a Manchester, Vt., urgent care clinic. Follow-up PCR testing by the state Department of Health detected just four positive cases, and widespread testing found no evidence of an outbreak in the area.

That incident, as well as a similar one at a Maine summer camp, raised questions about reliability. Subsequent investigations by Quidel and the FDA found no issues with the tests or the Manchester clinic's procedures.
...

And it's not just Vermont officials who have concerns. A national survey conducted by two eldercare industry groups and released in September found that 25 percent of the responding nursing homes had gotten at least one potential false-positive test result. Nevada health officials directed nursing homes to stop using the tests but rescinded the order after a threat of legal action from Health and Human Services.

Meanwhile, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services published guidelines in late August that require routine testing of nursing home residents and staff using either PCR or antigen tests. The frequency depends on the disease prevalence in the surrounding community. Homes in the hardest-hit areas of the country must test twice weekly; Vermont homes must test just once a month. ...

Dr. Richard Feifer, chief medical officer at Genesis HealthCare, said the company's nine nursing homes in Vermont are all using PCR tests to fulfill federal testing requirements — but have also begun testing residents and staff using the antigen machines as a supplement. In a statement, Feifer said the rapid-result antigen tests can fill in the gaps when residents or staff "develop symptoms in between testing cycles."

As tens of thousands of rapid test kits arrive from the federal government, it's unclear what the state will do with them. Still, antigen tests are becoming more widely available to the general public, not just to staffers and residents at long-term-care facilities. Earlier this month, Essex Junction-based Garnet Transport Medicine began offering both antigen tests and PCR tests at the Burlington International Airport. The service is available to travelers and members of the community. And ClearChoiceMD, an urgent care facility on Williston Road in South Burlington, offers the tests, as well.

A Seven Days staffer dropped by to request an antigen test last Friday. The clinic recommended a PCR test, as well, saying that method is more accurate. Two hours later, a worker swabbed the staffer twice in the parking lot. After fifteen minutes, she returned and handed over a piece of paper.

"Your Rapid COVID-19 test was negative," it read. "The test is roughly 86% accurate when negative, about 15% of negative test results will return positive when further testing is done, for this reason we sent out a nasal PCR COVID test for confirmation."

[stickdog99]

and these scare mongering false positive tests are also being utilized thoughout Europe

Today, the European Commission adopted a recommendation on the use of rapid antigen tests for the diagnosis of COVID-19. This follows the Commission's recommendation on 28 October to ensure a common approach and more efficient testing strategies across the EU. It builds on the guidance developed with Member States input and expert advice from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.

The recommendation provides guidance on how to select rapid antigen tests, when they are appropriate and who should perform them. It also calls for validation and mutual recognition of tests and their results. This comes ahead of the European Leaders' virtual meeting on 19 November on the EU response to the COVID-19 pandemic, following the 29 October European Council, where it was agreed to coordinate more on testing methods.

The Commission has also signed an agreement with the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) contributing €35.5 million, financed by the Emergency Support Instrument (ESI), to scale up COVID-19 testing capacity in the EU. The funding will be used to support training of staff for sampling collection and analysis and performance of tests, especially via mobile equipment.

Stella Kyriakides, Commissioner for Health and Food safety said: “Testing tells us what the extent of the spread is, where it is, and how it develops. It is a decisive tool to slow down the spread of COVID-19. To increase EU coordination on testing methods, we are today providing guidance to Member States on the use of rapid antigen test to better manage COVID-19 outbreaks. Being efficient on testing also requires having the necessary resources, which is why we are also today stepping up our support to increase Member States testing capacity. Support and solidarity is key to overcome this pandemic.”

Today's recommendation provides guidance to Member States on the use of rapid antigen tests to detect the virus in specific settings. These include situations where a fast identification of infected individuals supports the management of outbreaks and regular monitoring of high risk groups, such as medical personal or in nursing homes for elderly. Member States are encouraged to conduct rapid antigen tests in addition to RT-PCR tests to contain the spread of the virus, detect infections and limit isolation and quarantine measures.

Mutual recognition of test results is of utmost importance in order to facilitate cross border movement, cross border contact tracing and treatment. Member States are strongly encouraged to mutually recognise the test results for rapid antigen tests meeting the criteria in the recommendation carried out by authorised operating testing facilities in any EU Member States. Compliance with the recommendation may then contribute to the free movement of people and the smooth functioning of the internal market in times of limited testing capacities.

[stickdog99]

Note that the death rate is not spiking along with the supposed case rate, but it has increased somewhat. Hmmm, could that have anything to do with the fact that these new antigen tests have been foisted upon our nursing homes?

https://www.chillicothegazette.com/stor ... 332223002/

Over half of Ross County deaths in nursing homes, says Health Commissioner

While COVID cases rise across Ohio, one of the worst impacted groups has been nursing home residents.

Twenty-nine of Ross County's 55 deaths reported by the Ross County Health District as of Thursday afternoon have been in nursing homes or long-term care facilities, said Ross County Health Commissioner Garrett Guillozet.

Meanwhile, the Ross County Health District reports 237 total nursing home cases, including staff. This is a difference of 279 cases all included between State and County reporting.

One possible reason for the discrepancy is the inclusion of antigen tests that are considered suspected by ODH, said Guillozet.

"We only report those cases that are confirmed through PCR/RNA test. Often times, the Long Term Care Facility (LTCF) follows up with a PCR/RNA for those individuals who have a suspected rapid test and are symptomatic," said Guillozet.

"However, that is not the case for those who have a suspected rapid antigen test and are asymptomatic. We do not report those suspected cases in our case counts. Additionally, our reporting in our case counts in our update report are only what is reported to us from the LTCFs."

For those counting at home, that's 42 suspected rapid antigen test false positives among 237 PCR positives. Yet the CDC is forcing states to categories even PCR-confirmed false positive deaths as COVID-29 deaths!

[stickdog99]

And with the new weekly testing now being forced upon nursing home workers in France, expect the number of COVID-19 cases to keep soaring!

New health provisions will be applied in nursing homes, to stop the spread of the Covid-19 epidemic. “We recommend organizing screening of nursing home staff on a weekly basis from next week”, declared, Thursday, November 19, Brigitte Bourguignon, Minister for Autonomy, during a press briefing on the epidemic situation. To do this, 1.6 million antigenic tests will be delivered to these establishments.

[stickdog99]

from three days ago

Two Vermont elder care homes are facing growing outbreaks as the state’s Covid cases swell to record numbers.

Twenty-six residents and 12 staff have tested positive at Rutland Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center, Human Services Secretary Mike Smith reported on Tuesday. The outbreak has grown from nine cases last week.

The first resident tested positive after going to the hospital on Nov. 9 for a different procedure, said Ashley Hudson, a co-owner at Four Seasons. A few residents had mild symptoms of fever and a cough, but most have been asymptomatic, Hudson wrote in an email to VTDigger.

“Many of the residents have been bewildered as [the owners] shared with them the news of their positive test results,” she said. They run facility-wide testing for all 30 residents every Wednesday and Saturday, she said.

The facility has now closed to outside visitors, and stopped group activities and shared meals. “We are hopeful that things will start to dissipate,” she said. But with eight shared bathrooms, residents who are prone to wander or have cognitive impairment, as well as asymptomatic residents, “we remain concerned that we haven’t seen the last of our positive cases.”

None of those who tested positive at either location have been hospitalized. ...

For now, the state has recommended weekly or biweekly testing of staff members at all elder care homes, and has offered funding to support the effort.

“We’re counting on all our facilities to be vigilant and prevent the introduction of the virus into the buildings,” Smith said.

[stickdog99]

In every single state I check, the story is the same.

There have been over 1007 positive cases (30% of all cases since the pandemic began) in Vermont over just the last two weeks, yet there are just 17 COVID-19 related hospitalizations in Vermont currently, and there have been just 3 (of 62 total) COVID-19 related deaths in Vermont over that period. And remember that the CDC is forcing states to declare all deaths and hospitializations as COVID-related even if the only relationship they have to COVID is a false positive result on the shitty antigen tests that our federal government bought by the hundreds of millions!



OMG!!! LOCK UP THE CHILDREN! DON'T SEE ANY OF YOUR LOVED ONES FOR THE HOLIDAYS!! STAY HOME AND COMMIT SUICIDE LIKE A GOOD CITIZEN!!!

Now look at the death and hospitalization rates over this same time period.





LOL. So emergent care visits for "COVID-like illness" increased very slightly once it started to get colder in Vermont. That's it. Nothing more and nothing less. Nobody is getting or dying. And this is all during the same period that ther have been ZERO confirmed cases of influenza in all of Vermont! LOL. Just look at the chart!



Hmmm, with every single media outlet in Vermont and the national media screaming "COVID SPIKE!" at everyone 24/7, fewer than 4% of Vermont's emergency room or urgent care visits have anything to do with COVID-19-like illness or influenza-like illness. Am I really the only person looking at these data in the entire world?

[Belligerent Savant]

^^^^^

Can you share the link/source(s) for the last few screenshots? I'd like to see if a similar chart can be generated for other States.

Excellent analysis, stickdog. I waver between fury and sheer disappointment at the blanket large-scale acceptance (by others) of current news -- when I'm not simply tuning it out completely, that is.